


little orphan boy

by neverlasting_legend (splitdevotion)



Series: the Echo Cave series [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-11
Updated: 2013-12-11
Packaged: 2018-01-04 08:18:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1078708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/splitdevotion/pseuds/neverlasting_legend
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You don’t remember how old you were when you were taken – saved from that shit hole of a town but you know you were young, younger than most of the boys who come to the island now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	little orphan boy

You don’t remember how old you were when you were taken – _saved_ from that shit hole of a town but you know you were young, younger than most of the boys who come to the island now. 

You remember this. 

You were an orphan and you were neglected.  You lived on the streets – hence the title _street rat_ – and you were hungry and cold and so scared some days that thinking back to it now makes you choke with anger and hate.  Anger at all the adults who wouldn’t dare spare a glance other than to sneer at the dirty little orphan boy who hadn’t enough sense to die the previous winter.   Hate at yourself for still being hurt enough to be angry at people long dead in a town long deserted.

You were saved in the dead of night. 

It was snowing and you were so cold despite being bundled up in a pile of discarded ratted cloth that you thought that this was how you would die – huddled in the back of some dark alleyway, hoping that no one would chase you away for the night.

You had been waiting for sleep to claim you but instead had thought that death had gotten you first when you saw the Shadow.

You were terrified, obviously.  Even to a child, there is nothing natural about a shadow absent of a body and you had thought that the reaper had finally come to take you to the Maker. 

“Come away with me,” it said and you wanted to beg _no, I don’t want to die._

But then you thought about it.  Thought about how the cold invaded your flesh and wormed its way into your bones.  Thought about how hungry you would be tomorrow – how hungry you would be the day after.  Thought about how no one in this town cared if you lived or died and that no one to _mourn_ you if you went.

You took its hand then and thought, _maybe it’ll be peaceful_.

Sometimes you like to think that you did die that cold winter night and that Neverland is your own version of the afterlife.

It would be fitting you suppose. 

After all, Peter Pan is your god.


End file.
